148
votes
Accepted
Does this video show a water droplet in gravitational orbit?
The GIF was sourced from the International Space Station video by astronaut Don Pettit. The video depicts small water droplets orbiting a polyethylene knitting needle which was charged by rubbing it ...
- 18.7k
115
votes
Accepted
Are the claims made by Indian Ministers / personalities regarding ancient Indian inventions true?
Genetic science in Mahabharata
Prime Minister Modi claimed that genetic science and plastic surgery existed in Ancient India.
source: “We all read about Karna in the Mahabharata. If we think a little ...
- 42.8k
106
votes
Accepted
Did the British navy fail to take into account the ballistics correction due to Coriolis force during WW1 Falkland Islands battle?
No. It is a complete invention of an urban myth.
Unless anybody produces a Royal Navy document that even does any mention of this influence of Coriolis effect, this seems to be just untrue. A ...
- 43.9k
86
votes
Accepted
Do wooden building fires get hotter than 600°C?
Without acknowledging any of the conditions actually present in the church, wood fires can get much hotter than 600 °C.
The maximum temperatures measured within the pile were of the order of ...
- 43.9k
85
votes
Accepted
In the event of a siren warning the public of a gas leak, is it actually advisable to listen to the radio when smelling gas?
The Finnish website pelastustoimi advises to listen to the radio in the event of smelling gas.
Yes, but that needs to be put into context.
As stated, one might think this is what one should do if one ...
- 3,702
81
votes
Accepted
Can we determine for sure if the Sun revolves around the Earth?
The referenced link is correct; all frames of reference are equally valid in general relativity -- with a catch or two. One catch is that the mathematics can get a bit ugly (or more than a bit ugly), ...
- 14.4k
80
votes
Is there any possibility that CERN's Large Hadron Collider run 3 can be devastating?
No.
There is no chance of catastrophic consequences of the CERN run. CERN Website LSAG report
The simplest evidence of this comes from the fact that nothing particularly special is happening in the ...
- 3,557
78
votes
Accepted
Has the laser at Magurele, Romania reached a tenth of the Sun's power?
It's possible they are actually talking about the rate of energy given off by the Sun that reaches the Earth. However, they are not talking about the amount of energy released, but rather the rate of ...
- 22.3k
55
votes
Do wooden building fires get hotter than 600°C?
Probably yes: According to at least one expert, the temperature in the Notre Dame fire must have been extremely high, and probably exceeded 600°C.
Yesterday the Süddeutsche Zeitung, one of Germany's ...
- 9,251
54
votes
Accepted
Do snowballs snowball?
Only when the snow is "wet", not if the snow is powdery.
As this January 1910 Watson Wagon advertisement says:
The popularity of the Watson continues to grow like a snowball rolling down hill ...
- 103k
54
votes
Accepted
Does wetting a beer glass change the foam characteristics?
In 1953, a paper looking at some of the factors involved in beer foam answered this question almost as an incidental aside.
Jackson, S. (1953). FACTORS AFFECTING BEER FOAM I. CARBON DIOXIDE EVOLUTION....
- 139k
49
votes
Did Richard Feynman say that anyone who claims to understand quantum physics is lying or crazy?
I can’t find hard evidence for the “lying or crazy” quote, but as OP already mentioned, Feynman said something very similar in content, if perhaps less colorfully phrased:
I think I can safely say ...
- 4,539
47
votes
Accepted
Did a lightning strike make a river roll and boil?
This is not a lightning strike. It's an underwater blasting explosion
Snopes covered this a few days ago. Here's the article. The video was originally posted to YouTube in 2012 to host it for this ...
- 2,101
44
votes
Accepted
Did Albert Einstein say "the only reason for time is so that everything doesn't happen at once"?
The oldest confirmed use of any version of this quote that I was able to find is from Ray Cummings' short story The Time Professor, published in the Jan. 8, 1921 issue of Argosy All-Story Weekly (...
- 556
42
votes
Accepted
Did George Biddell Airy write a paper "On Certain conditions under which a Perpetual Motion is possible"?
The claim that George Biddell Airy wrote a paper titled “On certain Conditions under which Perpetual Motion is possible” which was published in the Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society ...
38
votes
Has the laser at Magurele, Romania reached a tenth of the Sun's power?
Power of the laser
This video shows interviews with people at the laser center. At 4:54 you can see the director of the center repeat the claim. In this video, that same director states that the ...
- 11.9k
34
votes
Do snowballs snowball?
I would have to say, yes, it does, but as evidence, one looks not at the scenario described of rolling a snowball down a hill.
Instead, in a snowy area, after a significant snowfall and, especially, ...
- 9,459
34
votes
Did the British navy fail to take into account the ballistics correction due to Coriolis force during WW1 Falkland Islands battle?
Rudolph Verner, the gunnery officer of the Inflexible, which took part in the battle, wrote a short set of notes about the successes and difficulties encountered during the engagement. He writes
...
- 11.1k
33
votes
Can we determine for sure if the Sun revolves around the Earth?
TLDR: the Rabbi is correct in a very specific technical sense, but it is not helpful to think about the question in the way he advocates.
Detailed answer:
The Rabbi's claim raises an interesting ...
- 4,539
31
votes
Accepted
Did Manahel Thabet develop a groundbreaking formula to measure distance in space without the use of light?
Did Manahel Thabet develop a groundbreaking formula to measure distance in space without the use of light?
NO! This extraordinary claim which came from Wikipedia:
In 2012, Thabet developed a ...
- 30.2k
30
votes
Did all iron on Earth come from outer space?
TL;DR
The majority of the Earth's iron was around when the planet formed. Calculations of the mass deposited by subsequent impacts show that these impacts were comparatively insignificant in changing ...
- 11.1k
28
votes
Do wooden building fires get hotter than 600°C?
Wood is a perfectly acceptable and common material used in metal forging even more so when it becomes partially combusted (charcoal). What really determines the heat though, is the amount of oxygen ...
- 381
26
votes
Did Manahel Thabet develop a groundbreaking formula to measure distance in space without the use of light?
Classmates.com lists her, with a photograph, as having attended a "DePaul Academy, Chicago IL" from 1992-1996 for high school.
There was a DePaul Academy high school in Chicago that closed ...
- 103k
26
votes
Do trackers hold their ears to the ground?
According to the 1832 book Six Months in America, volume II, at page 67:
At certain seasons of the year, their tramping and bellowing may be heard at a vast distance on the plains, by putting the ...
- 103k
25
votes
Accepted
Does turning the lamp in my classroom off and on use more energy than it being turned on for 30 minutes?
This page at Cambridge University says its a myth. There is a burst of energy when you turn them on, but its equivalent to 2 seconds of run time. Also the light lifetime is not seriously affected by ...
- 15.8k
24
votes
Accepted
Does water always boil at 100°C under normal atmospheric pressure?
Pure water at 1atm pressure boils at 100°C by definition (at least until 1954). However:
The new definition of centigrade is different, it depends on absolute zero degrees and the triple point of ...
- 78.5k
23
votes
"The Flat Earth Society has members all around the globe"?
I find no evidence of this being real, but I cannot prove a negative.
Tineye's first record of this image appeared on May 9, 2017. When I go to The Flat Earth Society's Facebook page, this post does ...
- 11.9k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible